Does Tim Kaine Care Anything About Gay Rights?

I and others have written about the recent Virginia Court decision involving Michael Moore, a former resident of Martinsville, Virginia, who was forced to resign from the Virginia Museum of Natural History because he is gay. As Pam Spaulding notes, Virginia has no anti-discrimination law, just Governor Tim Kaine's (who is also the DNC chair) 2006 executive order. I became involved in the case because Moore literally could find no other attorney to assist him after calling over a dozen attorneys. While Lambda Legal had provided him with the names of "cooperating attorneys," it had no interest in getting involved in the case. Likewise, the ACLU and HRC had no interest in getting involved in the case at the outset of the case, an issue I will return to later. In the aftermath of the ruling of the Martinsville Circuit Court, Kaine's office made the following comments to the Washington Blade:

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Gordon Hickey, a Kaine spokesperson, said the governor “feels very strongly” about non-discrimination in the state workforce, but that the executive order would be enforced within the executive branch of government as opposed to the court system.“The executive order remains in place, and it will be enforced as an internal policy,” he said. “If anybody is found to have been fired or discriminated against based on sexual orientation, they can be dealt with through personnel procedures of the state.”

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The statement, of course bears no resemblance to what we witnessed even though Moore filed a complain in accordance with the state's personnel procedures. Indeed, Kaine's office wanted nothing to do with the matter and the subordinate agency that handled the "investigation" was utterly incompetent in my view and seemed more dedicated to protecting the offending state agency than protecting Moore as an employee under the Executive Order. In short, in my opinion, Kaine doesn't give a flip about LGBT issues except for posturing to gain LGBT votes and campaign contributions. I suspect that he signed Executive Order 1 (2006) to fulfill a promise to LGBT organizations in his effort to get elected as Governor. That he is now DNC chair ought to severely disturb LGBT Americans given his disinterest in enforcing his own Executive Order.

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The second issue that this case brings up is the utter lack of support that the majority of LGBT citizens receive from organizations that proclaim themselves to be the protectors of LGBT Americans. When initially contacted, HRC had no absolutely no interest in getting involved because it did not want to upset its "good relationship" with Mr. Kaine. Other than e-mailing me a couple of cases, Lambda Legal was likewise missing in action and only re-contacted me after the Circuit Court ruling. The ACLU was a Jonny come lately in the matter, but at least assisted on drafting the legal memorandum in support of Moore's appeal petition to the Circuit Court pursuant to the state's personnel procedures. The Task Force never responded whatsoever.

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Unfortunately, Moore's experience does not seem to be unique in terms of being left to his own devices when victimized by anti-gay discrimination and bigotry. As one of a small number of out gay attorneys in Virginia, I know as a fact that vast areas of the state have no gay or gay friendly attorneys to potentially take on cases on behalf of LGBT Virginians. I also believe that Virginia is not alone in terms of the lack of available counsel to take on LGBT related cases. Yes, Lambda Legal and the ACLU have limited resources and need to select cases carefully. But something truly needs to be done to provide legal resources to LGBT citizens in areas where there are no gay friendly attorneys or where would be counsel are intimidated against taking on LGBT clients in cases where gay rights are involved.

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Personally, I wonder whether than spending money to go to Washington, D.C., soirees and cocktail parties, perhaps HRC and NGLTF ought to allocate more of their funds to litigation support for LGBT plaintiffs where equality and due process issues are involved. They certainly need to be asking some hard questions to Tim Kaine who seems to have adopted Barack Obama's habit of making statements of support but not following through with meaningful action.